"Dance of the Rings 2 - Ring of Intrigue" - читать интересную книгу автора (Fancher Jane S)

Or should have been. Kiyrstin couldn't blame the con-
fused gatekeeper for questioning Mikhyel's identity claims.
She'd seen some of the popular renditions of Mikhyel dun-
Mheric, and cartoonists and serious portraitists alike had
clung to Mikhyel's elegant, feature-defining beard and mus-
tache as his distinguishing characteristic, a look, Deymorin
had told her, that had spawned a new fashion throughout
the City.
And now Mikhyel dunMheric was as smooth-faced as a
child, the hope that his facial hair would return fading with
each passing day. Four long Rhomatumin weeks had passed
since the battle at Boreton turnout, four weeks since Mik-
hyel had fallen from the sky, burned almost beyond recog-
nition and nearly dead.
He had survived, had healed miraculously unscarredon
the outsidebut his body hair was gone. Everything, he'd
revealed once in answer to her unabashed query, except
his eyebrows and lashes, and the silky black mane confined
now in a braid at his back.
Black-haired and gray-eyed, with his black clothing and
beard, and that indefinable attitude, he must have once
made an imposing figure, despite his average height. These
days he looked more like a harassed cleric. Handsome
enough, if a woman's taste ran toward light-boned and slen-
der, and with a look about his eyes that could, when he
was distracted, become sad and a bit haunted.
But his eyes were keen enough now, gleaming with en-
gaged intellect, and neither the loss of a beard nor this
strange venue could undermine the effect of a voice sea-
soned in the courts of Rhomatum.
The gatekeeper's worries had passed beyond the Rho-
mandi brothers to the chaos of men and animals and legali-
ties of forced entry into city property. Leaving Mikhyel to
persuade the harassed civil servant that the way to handle
the situation was not to incarcerate each and every one of
the individuals trapped in this underground museum, Kiyr-
stin edged toward the aisle down which she thought she'd
heard Deymorin's voice.
There were stalls, and she saw Nikki's blond head bob-
bing on the far side of a broad horse-back, but no Dey-
morin. The sound must have been an echo from somewhere
else in this strange underground maze.
She leaned crossed arms on a stony outcrop, and scanned
this newest revelation of Rhomatum. The decor was
unique, to say the least. Stable, those around her had called
it. Except that in addition to stalls and hay, there were
restaurants and gift shops lining the entrance corridor and
a sign beside the hay bales that read: Tours start here.
The light came from oil lamps rather than the ley crystal
bulbs she would expect to light the shadows within a node's